Monday, November 09, 2009

Superbook

Yesterday I heard mass at St. Joseph's Shrine, while listening to the first reading about the story of Prophet Elijah and the widow with a son during the famine in Israel, I remembered that this bible account was one of the episodes shown in the animated series "Superbook." I can still vividly recall how that episode went.

Adults in their late twenties are familiar with this cartoon shown in the 80's and the early 90's over at GMA 7. This was one of my favorite animated series along with "Flying House." I love it so much I even became a member of its SuperKids Club.

Superbook followed the adventures of Christopher Peepers, his friend Joy and their toy robot Gizmo. It started when Christopher/Chris discovered the magical bible, the Superbook , that speaks and sends then through time to witness the bible story and interact with the different bible characters.

This animation was produced by the Tatsunoko Productions of Japan in cooperation with the Christian Broadcasting Network of the United States of America. The first episode was aired in Japan on October 1, 1981.

The cartoon was intended to reach out to the Christian minority in Japan. But when the anime was shown in a convention in France and received positive feedback, it was shown in other countries as well.

In the second series other characters like Chris' dog Ruffles and his cousin Uri were introduced. According to Wikipedia, a new series was developed in 2008.

I hope that I get to watch the new series because this cartoon brought back a lot of happy childhood memories.

I wish kids now can get to watch the new series as well or even the re-run so that they can get to enjoy it as much as I did at their age and learn wonderful lessons as well.

1 comment:

JerRocks2day
said...

I'm actually writing my own series thats a response to the new CGI Superbook. It's called Trouble Shooters [a crossover between Superbook and Flying House]. It stars Christopher, Joy, Gizmo, Justin, Corky, Angie as well as three original characters made for the show. It's kinda like a 'where are they now' deal. But it envisions them as detectives who protect the innocent.